Branded
by heartsways
Summary: Five times Emma calls Regina "Your Majesty" and one time she doesn't. Set in Storybrooke, post-curse.
1. Chapter 1

ONE

Whatever else Regina's done, the general consensus is that she was a good Mayor. And the mundane intricacies of running a town have never really appealed to any of the Charmings, despite Snow's eagerness to take the role of leader that everyone appears to have appointed her to. But paperwork and sitting in an office have never been what Snow truly aspires to, not even if she's accepted this new land that they're living in. Charming is even worse, preferring to become his daughter's deputy and work 'out in the field', as he puts it.

There are checks and balances, of course. Or, as Regina thinks of them, shackles and chains. Everything she does is under the auspices of a working group drawn from people she hasn't selected, much less approved. But for now, it seems to be enough to convince people that she isn't going to curse this town or reduce it to ashes. And by 'people', Regina understands that it's Henry and Emma she truly needs to convince. Because nobody else in this land really matters, only the son she loves and the woman who has taken him from her.

Sitting behind her desk in the Mayoral office, on a chair that is as far from a throne as it's possible to be, Regina sometimes simmers with resentment. It's not enough for her to take revenge, nor is it enough for her to give in to the magic that often crackles at her fingertips. But it's there, nonetheless.

So when Emma marches into her office, Regina is in no mood to be tried and tested – yet again – by the Sheriff's overwhelmingly irritating sense of righteousness. She glimpses a sight of her assistant, hovering nervously in the doorway before it bangs shut behind Emma and a grim smile pulls at her lips. Storybrooke knows by now that when tempers fly between the Sheriff and the deposed Evil Queen, it's safer to keep one's distance.

A thick file thuds down onto her desk and Emma leans over it, placing her hands palm down on its shiny surface. Regina smiles politely in that practiced manner she's perfected over decades: all teeth and detached interest.

"I wasn't expecting a visit from the Sheriff's office today," Regina says calmly, even going so far as to run her finger down the page of her open desk diary, which never has appointments in it these days that aren't sanctioned by an authority greater than her own.

"Oh please," Emma snarls, in no mood for pleasantries. "You were supposed to review these papers and sign them, Regina."

"I reviewed them, as requested," Regina says, with a rise of her eyebrows. "But you either want me to be Mayor of Storybrooke or you don't. And you, Miss Swan, either want to be Sheriff, or you don't."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Emma growls.

"It's not supposed to mean anything," Regina leans back in her chair and rests her fingertips on the edge of the desk with a light, careful, delicate touch. "What it does mean, however, is that even in this new regime we're all living under, the paperwork you file for the Sheriff's office is woefully lacking in anything approaching order."

Emma removes her hand from the desk, standing up and folding her arms over her chest. The huff of air that comes from her lips is enough of an admission for Regina to smile again, but this time it's a grin of wicked, malicious triumph. Her victories these days might be small, but she's damned if she's not going to indulge in them all the same.

"I don't have time for – " Emma starts, but at the sight of a single eyebrow quirked in her direction, she shuffles her feet on the floor and frowns.

"If you're finding the duties of Sheriff too taxing, then perhaps you should give the job over to someone better equipped," Regina says in a tone that makes Emma bristle and scowl at her.

"Like?"

"Oh, I don't know," Regina hums and taps her finger on the edge of the desk in an appearance of deliberation. "Your parents seem to think that they can enforce every other law in our town, so why not that meted out by the Sheriff's office?"

She doesn't mean it to come out in the recalcitrant manner that it does. Nor does she mean to intentionally anger Emma, either, because when all is said and done, Regina is sick of fighting, deep down. She's tired of it. And this new life, however restricted it might be, is one where she can glean some sense of comfort in the days she's allowed to spend with Henry.

"Don't be ridiculous!" Emma snaps.

"Then get your paperwork in order," Regina returns, just as sharply.

For a moment, they enter into a standoff that's reminiscent of the old days, when Emma first came to Storybrooke. There's a part of her that welcomes it; that realizes she's missed the antagonism of a more powerful Regina. And for all the reasons she knows she shouldn't, she feels a comforting fire start to burn in her belly.

If she's learned anything since coming here, then it's been that even the possibility of change is seductive. And even if Emma wants to lash out at Regina, to break the woman as well as the curse she enacted, she knows that change is the most difficult thing either of them will ever do.

So she leans forwards, sweeping the file up into her arms and staring down at Regina with something like sympathy.

"I'll have it done by tonight," she says. Because if they're going to aim for some semblance of normality, then she'll play her part accordingly.

Regina nods, a suspicious glint in her eyes. It's not like Emma Swan to back down from anything; the girl is as pigheaded as her mother, only without the breeding instilled from a childhood spent as a princess in a fairytale castle.

"Thank you," Regina finally says, a little cautiously.

Emma takes a few steps away from the desk and drops into a low bow, spreading her arms wide before she rises and looks at Regina with a distinct sneer on her lips.

"It's my pleasure, your Majesty," she says. And she can tell, before she turns abruptly on her heel and stalks towards the door, that even her sympathy for the devil has its constraints, change or not.


	2. Chapter 2

TWO

When Regina opens the door, Emma thrusts the file at her without so much as a greeting. Regina stares at it for a long moment before taking it and proffering a smile of thanks that's a little less tight than usual, a little less guarded. She's had two more glasses of whiskey than is advisable, and two more before that just to quell the anxiety that's roiled in her stomach since earlier on in the day.

She tries not to dwell on things anymore. After all, it's being _unable_ to let go of things that brought her here in the first place. But Emma's jibe has sat uncomfortably in her gut since the Sheriff left her office and even now, after alcohol has burned its way down her throat and cauterized her jangling nerves somewhat, Regina is _still_ irritated.

"Want me to stay while you check it over?" Emma is being deliberately incendiary, her tone more mocking than anything else, and it's only when Regina glares at her that she relents a little. But she's spent three hours going over the file and correcting the mistakes that Regina had identified with neon post-its, each bearing her impossibly neat handwriting.

"That won't be necessary," Regina shakes her head and immediately wishes she hadn't, the alcohol blurring her vision for a second. "I trust you, Sheriff."

Emma snorts derisively and tosses her head. "No, you don't."

Maybe it's because her defenses are down, or perhaps it's because her whiskey wasn't as diluted as it should have been, but Regina can't stop the low chuckle that comes from her throat. Surprised, Emma's eyes widen but she lets out an almost relieved laugh as Regina steps back from the door, swinging her arm wide in a gesture of welcome.

"Would you care to come in for a drink?"

She means it as she says it before both women remember that night, not so long ago, when Regina's invitation was borne of suspicion and a prescient threat that played out over months of aggression and hurt. Regina drops her head, because tonight she knows that she doesn't want to be alone, and that's really the only caveat attached to the drink she's offering. That even the company of the Savior, who broke her curse and her heart in one fell swoop, is preferable to the empty rooms of a house that has begun to feel more like a prison.

"Uh…" Emma frowns before Regina lifts her head and she sees brown eyes that gaze at her in hopeful surrender. It isn't how she's remembered Regina at all. Not how she knew her, either. And there it is again – that sympathy that Emma feels so instantly and strongly. It bothers Emma in the way that falling in love with Henry bothered her, because she didn't _want _to feel it; didn't _want_ to care about him or feel beholden to stay with him. She doesn't want to feel _this_, either. She doesn't want to feel anything about Regina, or _for_ her.

"It's just a drink, Sheriff," Regina sighs. "My days of poisoning your family are well and truly over, I can guarantee you of that."

It's not the most heartfelt apology that Emma's ever heard, but it's something. And maybe _something_ is better than the hard-lipped silence that Regina has given all of them up until now. So she shrugs and nods, stepping over the threshold to the house and following Regina into the study where a fire crackles in the grate and the air is enticingly cozy.

Busying herself with the decanter and the ice bucket, Regina's back is turned as Emma drops into one of the chairs, stretching out her legs in front of her. She knows that she appears more comfortable than she feels, taking the glass of whiskey that Regina offers with a tentative hand, watching the other woman carefully as Regina positions herself opposite, knees drawn together, one ankle over the other.

"You could have brought the file to my office tomorrow," Regina says, sipping at her drink before she stares into the tumbler and grimaces a little. She places it carefully onto the low table in front of her and looks across it at Emma with slightly glassy eyes.

Emma shrugs carelessly, glancing at the file that Regina's discarded across the room. Snow had said the same thing before she'd left the apartment and now, as then, Emma knows that it's not about the file. It's not about paperwork. It's not really about anything _remotely_ connected to how this town runs because Emma has realized that Storybrooke will continue to thrive, albeit in a slightly different fashion than before the curse was broken. But it will thrive, nonetheless, whether paperwork is filed or not.

She couldn't explain to Snow why she felt the need to come to Regina's tonight. She's not fully sure she can explain it to herself, but as she looks at the woman opposite, swaying a little in her seat, Emma thinks that her arrival might have been more than timely.

"I know how you are for dotting the i's and crossing the t's," she says easily, although it's not meant as an insult. She spent months being secretly jealous of the way that Regina managed a son and a town and always looked like the most pristine, together businesswoman. Her own life had always been somewhat erratic; her clothing even more so. And now Henry is living with her at the apartment, Emma knows that without Mary Margaret – Snow – her _mother_ to help out, life would be a lot more hectic than it already has become after the curse.

"Being Mayor is a little more than that," Regina insists, then bites at her lower lip. Being Mayor means nothing to her, not any more. She does it because it's all that's been offered; all that's left, really.

"Of course it is," Emma grins widely. "You get that fancy office to sit in and lord it all over us, too."

Regina lets out a snort before she lays out her hands on her knees, fingertips clenching slightly over the edge of her dress. She directs as polite a smile as she can muster towards Emma and tries not to imagine that the entire town is laughing at her, mocking any delusions towards grandeur that they think she entertains when she's sitting in her office, alone and ignored. Just as she does here, night after night.

"Of course," she nods. "Now, is there anything else I can get for you, Sheriff?"

Gulping at her whiskey, Emma leans forwards, planting the glass firmly onto the table. She's known Regina long enough to understand when a conversation is over and when she's being politely but firmly dismissed. Rising to her feet, she watches as Regina does the same, one hand reaching out to grasp at the back of the couch as she stumbles a little.

"Everything okay?" Emma's across the room and at Regina's side before either of them remember who they are or, at the very least, who they've been, especially to one another. She peers into Regina's face, the other woman turning away from her and righting herself with as much dignity as she can manage.

"Regina," Emma says a little more gently, "how many drinks have you had?" She squints across the room at the decanter that's now only a third full.

"Not nearly enough," Regina mutters, pushing at her hair. "Go home, Sheriff. I'm not a danger to anyone."

A bitter smile parts her lips. "Not anymore."

"Right, and what about to yourself?"

Now Regina whirls around, ignoring the way her head spins as she does so, and fixes Emma with a haughty glare.

"If you think," she spits, "that I'm drowning my sorrows, then you're sadly mistaken."

"**Am** I?" Emma retorts. "Because it looks like that's **exactly** what you're doing, your Majesty."

"Stop it!" Regina's voice is high-pitched, close to a scream as she turns on Emma, one hand lifted high in the air to deliver retribution. "Stop calling me that!"

Emma's reflexes are quick – faster than Regina's numbed ones – and her fingers wrap around the other woman's wrist, staying its progress as alarm rockets through her chest. There's a wildness in Regina's eyes that Emma hasn't seen for a long time, not since Henry lay in a hospital bed and magic came to Storybrooke.

"My name is…is Regina."

The tension in her voice is matched only by the muscles that stretch and contract under Emma's grasp. Of all the names she's been called over the years – and Regina knows there have been many, none of them complimentary – it's the one that tells her who she _isn't_ that hurts the most. She's been many things: daughter, wife, even a mother of sorts, but she's never really been a queen. Not over a realm of subjects who bowed to her only because she forced them to their knees first.

"Alright," Emma says evenly, "Regina."

"Now, take your hand off me and go home, Miss Swan. I'm sure Henry will be worried."

"He'll be even more worried if he finds out you've been having a pity party for one," Emma says, but she loosens her grip on Regina's wrist, finally letting go completely. She tries not to look at the imprint of her fingers on Regina's skin, or the way that the other woman flinches at the possibility of Henry caring for her more than is obligatory.

"He asks about you all the time," Emma ventures, but she sees the way Regina's lip curls and how the woman turns away from her, arms clutching around her torso. It's sympathy that makes her reach out, laying a hand on Regina's shoulder. And it's sympathy that's in her eyes when Regina turns, her face almost horrified in response.

"He believes that you're trying…to…to change. And I – I believe in **him**, so – "

Later, Regina will blame it on the alcohol and the way that Emma looks at her. Later, when she's alone, she'll allow herself to feel regret. But now, in the heady warmth that emanates from the fire and the whiskey in her gut, Regina lunges for the one shred of compassion that is held in front of her. The last tatters of care that might exist for her in this world.

Her lips crash against Emma's in a kiss that's ungainly, lacking the deliberate, careful seduction that she always used to display. She feels momentary resistance before Emma's fingers scrabble at her shoulder, nails scraping over the collar of her dress and against her neck. Then Emma's mouth is open, their tongues moving over one another and the kiss takes on another dimension, moving from desperation to something else; something that leaps in Regina's chest and ignites a newer fire at the tops of her thighs. It's _that_, more than anything else, that makes her draw back, stumbling away from Emma's touch.

Emma has that look on her face that Regina's seen countless times before: like the experience and realization is all too much for her, rendering her speechless and open-mouthed. They're still standing too close to one another and Regina takes another few steps back, away from what she's done. She'll pick up the pieces later. It's what she's best at, after all.

"Go home, Emma," she says in a voice that's now hoarse. She bends to pick up her glass from the table, putting it to her lips with a trembling hand.

By the time she's taken her first sip and wondered at how much alcohol it will take to blank this from her mind, she's alone again.


	3. Chapter 3

THREE

It's been a few days. Three, to be exact. Not that Regina's counting or anything. But she won't see Henry until the weekend and that means she has no reason to see Emma before then, either. She's not entirely sure she _wants_ to, which is unusual for her. Regina's always taken great pleasure in seeing the detritus left by her actions, always loved knowing that chaos was contained in the palm of her hand, hers to control and mete out on those deserving of it. So she should have found consolation in the expression that was on Emma's face, the undisguised horror at how she'd returned Regina's kiss and what that might mean for a Savior and an Evil Queen.

But Regina fancies that she can still feel Emma's lips on her own, their shape and pressure and softness tingling in a way she hasn't really felt since -

These days, she can't even bring herself to think his name, let alone say it. Not after she reduced Daniel and her last, lingering hope to dust before her eyes. All she has is Henry now; the last part of her that can still love, _does_, and all she exists for now is to prove herself worthy of it. Of _him_.

Daytime isn't so bad – at least then she can distract herself with town codes and the sort of public service that is laughable, given where she's come from and who she was. But the nights stretch out beyond her, much longer and darker than before. And where she once welcomed the pitch, now she abhors it because it only serves to remind her that she's utterly alone in this world save all the bad she's done, picking over her memories with blackened, grasping hands.

She's taken to pacing the house at night, walking through each room and pausing in its center, trying to remember what it felt like to have Henry here. She wishes she'd been more lenient, allowed him to be an untidy child, allowed him to be _any_ kind of child. At least then she might have memories of a family house where noise and clutter and laughter filled the air instead of the clinical quiet that roars in her ears.

Regret is easy, she's discovered. It seeps from her like blood from an open wound that cannot be stemmed, cannot be healed. So many regrets, so many sorrows. And all she's left with is an empty house and an even emptier life.

It breaks her routine, then, when the persistent knocking on her front door becomes a pounding fist, the door rattling a little on its hinges. As she turns the handle, Emma places her palm onto the wood and pushes it wide open, marching inside the house with a frown on her face and a downturned mouth that heralds little to no good, Regina suspects.

Emma kicks the door shut behind her and the bang it makes echoes in the hallway. Regina flinches in anticipation, catching sight of Emma's balled fists and the way that she strides back and forth in front of her for a few, long seconds.

"Sheriff Swan," Regina says, as Emma comes to a stop in front of her, stepping in far too close to be anything other than threatening.

"It's Emma," the Sheriff barks. "Just…just Emma."

As she looks at the woman, Regina can see that bravado, so often the attire that Emma pulls on these days, has gone. Stripped down to the bare bones that her age and experience dictates, all Regina sees is a woman who is conflicted, confused and at odds with who she's meant to be in this land.

"Emma," Regina corrects herself with a slight nod of her head. "Why are you here?"

"The other night," Emma blurts, and it's clear that she's been wanting to broach this for as many days as she's been absent. "The other night," she repeats, "why did you…what **was** that?"

Even as stormy green eyes turn upon her, Regina lifts her chin in an effort of defiance. "I don't know what you're talking about," she says.

"Oh yeah?" Emma always used to fall for the Evil Queen act but now it's not working anymore. _Few things are_, Regina sighs inwardly, as Emma's lip curls and she advances with an almost territorial air. "How about I remind you?"

The strong, capable hands of the Savior are on her shoulders and Regina finds herself propelled backwards until she hits the wall, air gushing form her lungs in surprise and not a little fear. But there's no alcohol to dull her senses tonight, so she's quick to plant her hands firmly over Emma's leather-clad shoulders, keeping a distance between them that's now become essential.

"No!" Regina gasps, twisting in Emma's grip. "Don't – please. I don't…don't want that."

The air between them crackles as Emma stares at her. Regina can't deny that there's something between them; something contained in the other woman's touch and her closeness that both sickens and intrigues her. But it's the pity in Emma's eyes that she can't quite abide, and as the blonde's grip on her eases before Emma finally steps back, Regina looks away, not wanting to see the reflection of herself as she is now. Being pitied has always been the vanguard of someone who's weak.

But perhaps that's who she is now.

It doesn't make it any easier to accept, much less see in the clear green eyes that gaze at her curiously.

"Then **why**?" Emma insists. "If you don't want it…don't want **me** then…why did you…?"

"I don't know," Regina says quickly. And there's a part of her that really doesn't.

"See, I think you do," Emma responds, thumbs hooking into the back pockets of her jeans. "You never do **anything** without thinking it through, even when you've got half a decanter of whiskey inside you."

Despite herself, Regina laughs, but it's a bitter sound that falls from her lips. There's no pleasure to be had in admitting weakness, after all.

"That may have been true in the past," she says quietly. "But that sort of behavior belongs to another time. Another me."

She looks Emma in the eye now, direct and as assured as she can be in this moment. "Clearly, you don't appear to think I've changed at all."

"I know you're trying," Emma offers, cocking her head to one side.

"Do you? Because what I'm **trying** to do, **Emma**," Regina says the other woman's name with a heavy, deliberate tone, "is merely survive. Just as I've always done. Do you even know how that feels?"

"Actually, yeah," Emma nods and sighs. The long histories that everyone in Storybrooke has with Regina don't account for the instinct that burns in her eyes – that thrives in both of them no matter what obstacles life puts in their way. It strikes Emma as ironic that the Savior might be the only person who can both see and understand where Regina is now: a place where survival is a daily battle just to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

But Regina's lips press against one another and she turns her head slightly, leaning back against the wall and humming a sound of disbelief.

"I do," Emma says, a little more fiercely. "Regina, we might survive in different ways but I know how it feels. I spent most of my life trying to figure out what the hell I was doing or where I was going."

"And now you know." Regina's voice drips with envy and resentment and all the things she tries so hard to keep at bay. "Now you're the Savior and I'm…I'm nothing to these people. I'm nothing to anyone."

"That's not true." Emma shifts, pulling her thumbs from her jeans and holding out her hands in a gesture of benevolence. "Henry – "

"Henry feels pity for me. He's a **child**, Miss Swan. And when he grows into an adult, he'll leave me behind in favor of his new life and his new family."

"Henry cares about you." Emma's face is hard with the remnants of conversations she's had with her son, where his muddled comprehension of who Regina _has_ been to him and who she _might_ be is shadowed with his perceptions of a reality that is contained in a storybook.

Regina shrugs and brushes back a lock of errant hair from her cheek. "Perhaps," she says slowly. "But what I fail to understand is why **you** do. Why you're even here."

"Because you're in my son's life, no matter what. And as long as you're in **his** life, you're in **mine**. And yeah, I get it; it might not be what we would have chosen for any of us. It's…it's complicated."

The roll of Regina's eyes makes Emma shift slightly and she puffs out her cheeks, shaking her head a little.

"But the only way we're going to do this – the only way we **can** do this is by being honest. You've told a whole heap of lies in your life, Regina, to protect yourself. And so – so have I."

It's not something Emma's proud of, not with the mantle she's adopted in the eyes of all those fairytale characters who look on her as some sort of demi-god. But she can see from the way Regina gazes at her that something about what she's saying is inching past that hard exterior the other woman has carefully constructed.

"So be honest with me," she says, a little more gently. "The other night. What was that about?"

Regina takes a breath and straightens, swallowing visibly before opening her mouth. "It was about getting you to leave me alone," she admits. "Getting you out of my house before you threw more of your heartfelt **pity** at me."

The scorn in her voice is evident, and a nerve ticks on Emma's cheek as she grinds her back teeth together. She came here with fury in her gut, and it resurfaces again as she clenches her hands into fists so hard that she can feel the prick of her fingernails into her palms.

"If I feel sorry for you," she forces out, "it's because I like to believe that there's a human being underneath all that crap you throw at everyone."

"Ah," Regina says, a strange light entering her eyes, "I see you've inherited that sense of self-righteous optimism that your mother had. She believed that if she took pity on me then she could make me into someone else. But that girl was weak, Emma, and I swore I'd never be so vulnerable again – not to your mother, at least. Tell me, dear, do you think that if you just feel **sorry** enough for me then I'll suddenly change into what you and your family want me to be? Do you really think it's that easy?"

"Nothing about you is easy," Emma spits and this, at least, is a truth that neither of them can deny, even though it hunches Emma's shoulders and lifts Regina's chin proudly. "Jesus, Regina, why do you have to make things so difficult?"

"Because that's how I survive!" Regina leans forwards now, much closer to Emma than she wants or needs to, but there's something about this woman – the Savior – that compels her to rise up, to try to glean some semblance of her former self, to gather the last vestiges of fight she has in her and antagonize Emma into action.

Of course, that's precisely what it does. If Regina knows anything, then it's that the familial blood that runs through Emma's veins will always surge towards her, always mingle with her own in affection that's soured and been tainted with too much betrayal. Because Emma is a product of the thing that Regina lost so long ago, the thing that has made its absence felt for her entire life since Daniel's death. Sometimes Regina feels as though she can see it: true love, shining from Emma like the light that went out in her heart the night he died.

In as much as it appalls her, she also feels the need to strain towards it. It may not be love as she's felt it, wanted it and yearned for it, but it's love, nonetheless. And love, true or not, is better than nothing. Better than what she's had.

She thinks she sees a glimpse of it in Emma's eyes as the blonde darts towards her; that whatever magic is in the blonde's touch tingles on her skin as Emma's hands close around her upper arms. Regina is pushed back against the wall again, this time with Emma's body flush on her own, that damned Sheriff's badge uncomfortably digging into her hip bone.

"I know about survival," Emma hisses, her breath sweet and warm on Regina's cheek. "And I have to say, your Majesty, that **this**? What you're doing? This ain't it."

The title, thrown at her like so many insults before, hurts almost as much as the pressure of Emma's mouth on her own, hard and unrelenting. The blonde is strong, much stronger than Regina suspected, and even as she bucks from the wall in a show of resistance, she can't help but give in to the hands that move to her neck, the tongue that pushes past her lips and moves over her own.

A sound comes from Emma's throat, somewhere between a groan and a sigh. It's involuntary, a physical reaction to the shape of Regina's limbs and the swell of her breasts and hips. They've both been without this sort of contact for so long that to feel it now is intoxicating, a flurry of sensation that takes them both by surprise and urges them into actions that are surely unwise.

Perhaps it's Emma – who she is and what she represents, or perhaps it's just that Regina hasn't been touched by anyone in so long because _they_ wanted it that she allows Emma to kick her feet apart with a heavy boot as her head lolls back. Fingers scrabble at the hem of her dress as Emma's mouth moves to her neck, lips pinching and pulling at her flesh.

Regina finds herself clutching at Emma's leather jacket as a denim-clad thigh works its way between her legs and presses into her. Her knees all but buckle and she slumps against Emma as the blonde mutters something into the hollow beneath her ear. It makes Regina dizzy and she tries to talk but when she opens her mouth nothing comes out but a protracted, grated breath.

She still can't talk when Emma reaches for her wrists and pins them against the wall high above her head. There'd be no point anyway. For all the protestations that might fall from her lips, Regina _does_ want this: it won't assuage the loneliness completely, but it will keep it at enough of a distance for her to get through another day, another week, maybe longer.

Emma's mouth descends on her own again, urgent and greedy. Regina closes her eyes as her dress is unceremoniously pushed up her thighs and Emma's hand shoves its way in between them. Her touch is careless and hasty, but it still makes Regina arch from the wall as Emma's fingertips meet warm wetness.

Regina thinks of her conquests, of how sex was always about power and never about surrender – not _hers_, anyway. All the warm bodies that lay in her bed were there at her behest and similarly dismissed when she'd taken what she wanted. She'd taught herself not to crave the touch of a lover, so it's somewhat surprising that she succumbs so easily to the fingers that thrust inside her. Even more so that she begins to move forwards onto Emma's hand as though she doesn't just want this, she _needs_ it, too.

The blonde's face is pressed into the curve of Regina's neck where it meets her shoulder. Emma is breathing heavily, trying to focus on the way this feels, trying to think of how much she needs this sense of release, crawling out from underneath the burdens this town has placed on her shoulders. She's got everything she ever wanted and there's still a part of her that wants to run away. It's why she came to Regina's the other night. It's why she returned tonight, too.

This makes things complicated, of course; more than Emma prefers to contemplate. But like Regina said, it's all about survival. And Emma knows that she needs this in order to prolong hers. Despite how the rest of the town sees Regina, Emma sometimes thinks that the deposed Evil Queen is like a wounded animal: prepared to rip apart anything or anyone who comes too close. So maybe she and Regina aren't so very different and it's their isolation that's helped to close the distance between them without fear of attachment.

Pushing deeper into flesh that closes hotly around her fingers, Emma hears Regina's voice cry out above her head. It sends a thrill from the base of her neck prickling down her spine, pooling between her thighs and bringing a faint smile to her lips. Without thinking, she moves her head and presses a wet kiss into the dip of Regina's neck, inhaling the scent of the other woman. Regina cries out again as Emma's fingers twist inside her and the sound that comes from her lips is raw and broken, echoing from the high ceiling of the hallway. Regina writhes and tugs at the grasp Emma has on her wrists, pinned to the wall, but she never once makes an effort to break free.

Restrained, just as she's been for most of her life, Regina can't remember feeling so free. It's almost perverse that it should be Emma Swan whose breath is on her skin, hot and heavy and keeping pace with the rise and fall of her own chest; the sense of wrongness about all of this is probably what makes it so compelling, Regina thinks. But then, hasn't she always been drawn to things she shouldn't, powers she shouldn't, people and hearts that she shouldn't? Being with Emma Swan in this way is just another transgression to add to a line that stretches back further than the blonde's entire existence, isn't it?

As Emma lifts her head, looking carefully into Regina's eyes, there's a moment of realization. Transgression, this might be. But it's not the same as before – not as anything Regina's ever done before. The self-satisfied smile that creeps over Emma's mouth should spur her on to anger. But the fingers inside her hook, scrape back, plunge into sensitive, aching flesh and Regina can't do anything but suck in lungfuls of air as she moves towards climax.

Yes. This is something of a rebellion for them both, crossing lines that each woman had sought to score deeply in the ground between them.

Regina opens her mouth to say something; to try and voice the sensations that shudder up her body as Emma's lips drag a hot, damp line over her jaw. But she knows that words are redundant because what more can they say that they haven't already, one way or another? Whatever remains unspoken between them is surely intended to stay that way, to become buried under the rising heat and the way Emma presses her mouth hard onto Regina's, silencing her once and for all.

Maybe it doesn't really matter anyway, Regina's last coherent thought urges her towards oblivion. She's resisted it before, so many times that as it yawns up around her, buzzing and fizzing and popping at the back of her neck, she can't help but wonder what it might feel like to actually surrender to it now. Now that she can. Now that she must.

When she comes, she's shaking and whimpering and falling against Emma as though it's the first time she's ever been made to feel like this, climax like this, let the uncontrollable force of her orgasm rocket through each and every nerve, vein, muscle, fiber of her body. It's never really been like this before; it's always been because she demanded it, not because someone else really made her _feel_ it.

Emma leans her forehead against Regina's shoulder, tiny beads of sweat forming just up near her hairline and a tiny smile forming on her lips. She releases Regina's wrists and feels the other woman's hands drift downwards, touching her hair, her face, her neck and shoulders. Emma's always hated the way lovers felt it necessary to clutch at her after sex, trying to entice her to stay when all she ever wanted to do was leave. But as Regina's fingers travel over her body before finally resting lightly on her hips, she allows the other woman to embrace her and hold her in place, just for now.


	4. Chapter 4

FOUR

Regina's eyes roll back in her head as it sinks into the soft cushion of the huge chair she's sitting in. The shirt she'd carefully pressed last night is half open and wrinkled, almost hanging off one of her shoulders and rucked up above her waist. She can barely catch her breath and, when she does, it only escapes back over her lips in a ragged, guttural groan as everything spins and her limbs become liquid.

She loves this moment, when she can almost lose herself in something that is only about pleasure. It's pure, this sensation; undiluted by the ache that emotion always brings. It crosses her mind that, were it possible, she might want to feel this way all the time. The mere suggestion makes her catch her lower lip with her teeth and she represses the urge to give way to hysterical laughter. Because feeling this way relies on someone else. Feeling this way depends on someone else wanting her to.

And when was the last time anyone did anything simply for Regina's own sake? When was the last time she deserved it?

Finally lifting her head, she stares down at the blonde hair snaking over her thighs and shivers a little at the gush of hot breath on her skin. Emma's radio has crackled twice with static since it was thrown carelessly onto the couch across the room, but it's mostly silence that rushes in to fill the spaces they've created between them; a vacuum that exists independently of who they are.

This has become a routine of sorts. In Regina's house, Emma can pretend that nothing outside is real and indulge in behavior that is reminiscent of a time before this: before curses and fairytales and parents that she doesn't really know. Regina asks nothing of her, opening the door with downcast eyes as though this is her punishment and retribution. It's a twisted sort of sentence, to be so casually stripped of her dignity and her clothes, to allow Emma free rein to do what she will with a body that has shamefully begun to long for the Savior's touch.

It can't last, of course. And Regina knows it every time she arches into Emma's caress. She feels the end approaching with every line her fingertips trace down Emma's body, every whispered entreaty that falls from the blonde's lips and every gasp of surprise as Regina teases and pulls another satisfying climax from the woman she's supposed to hate. But for now, for as long as it lasts, it feels better than the alternative; better than a life without someone to touch her and make her feel alive in tiny, heated moments that rush through her veins like mercury.

Emma rises up, letting Regina's leg, hooked and held over her shoulder, fall to the floor. She pushes at her hair, a lazy grin of distant conceit across lips that glisten with a wet sheen.

"Shit, I needed that," she says, then notices the way that Regina's fingers are digging like claws into the arms of the chair, as though the other woman can't bear to let go for fear this might end. "Don't worry," she adds, "I don't have to rush off. We've still got some time."

Heart still pounding madly, Regina takes a few long, measured breaths before she can find the wherewithal to speak. When she does, her voice is graveled, almost lost in her throat as she swallows with an audible gulp.

"Careful, dear," she says. "I might think this…**arrangement** has started to mean something to you." She intends it as a joke, but the way her voice strains over the words puts a frown onto Emma's brow as the blonde kneels and places her hands onto Regina's bare legs.

"I don't know what it means," she shrugs. "Do you?"

Regina smiles sadly; explanations would only expose the fluttering fear she feels every time there's a knock on her door, knowing that no matter what time it is, or how long Emma's absences are between visits, that she'll always allow the Savior into her home. That she'll always, deep down, crave the light and life that Emma embodies – that she just _is_, without even trying.

At the back of her mind, Regina can't help wondering if by doing this, by offering herself up to Emma, it might make the dark places inside her a little less black.

"Hey," Emma leans forwards, pressing her body against Regina's, "it doesn't matter, you know. What it means or whether it means something at **all**…it doesn't matter."

She moves to kiss Regina only to stop when the other woman jerks her head back, eyes widening in appalled hesitation.

"No," Regina whispers, turning her head to one side. "I don't – I don't do that."

She puts her hands onto Emma's shoulders even as the blonde presses forwards again and lets out a surprised, breathy laugh at the resistance. But Regina is resolute, her lips drawing into a firm line that makes Emma's eyebrows rise in disbelief. Because of all the things they've done – all the dark places they've visited in the rise and fall of one another's bodies – it's this inconsequential action that makes Regina demur.

"Jesus," Emma groans disparagingly. "I never took you for such a prude, your Majesty."

Regina's brows knit together and one of her hands slides up into Emma's hair, fisting it and holding just tightly enough to elicit a gasp from lips that shine with the remnants of her own desire. Emma uses the title wisely now, fully conscious of what it evokes and what it means – what it _has_ meant to Regina for so many shattered years. Green eyes acquire a darker hue and Regina's fingers hook in Emma's hair, nails scraping over her scalp.

"I told you, I don't like it when you call me that. It's not who I am anymore," Regina hisses through gritted teeth, but the harder she tugs on Emma's hair, the more the blonde smirks.

"Oh come on, Regina," Emma murmurs, and the tip of her tongue reaches out to dance over her bottom lip. "Don't try telling me she's not in there somewhere, just **aching**," she sucks in air and swallows as Regina's other hand pushes down between them and fingers make their way past the waistband of her underwear, "to come out."

"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Regina growls, and for a second, she feels a surge of destruction, thick and black, rise in her chest. Because that's the truth about magic: it's like a cancer, growing inside her, smothering the woman she's trying so hard to be. And it never, _ever_ goes away.

"Not as much as you would." Emma's voice wavers a little as Regina's fingers move over the patch of wiry hair between her legs, reaching further down and sliding against flesh that's been wet ever since they half-undressed, too eager to wait, too hungry to take this to the bedroom. "You took everything else, but now you won't even take a single kiss."

It's obscene, the way that Emma taunts her. It churns in Regina's belly and she knows she should stop this – should have stopped it before now. But the truth of the matter is that both of them are too far gone, too far into this to bring anything to a halt now. Emma's been the only constant in her life for these last few weeks and Regina knows that she's reluctant to give it up. As she keeps telling herself, this kind of companionship is better than none at all.

So she clenches her fist in Emma's hair and tugs the woman's face close to her own, leaning down over the blonde with a tiny sneer tugging at the corner of her mouth. When her lips touch Emma's, she slides inside the girl with fingers that are deft, forceful and unrelentingly hard.

Emma moans into her mouth and Regina tastes herself: sweet and musky. She runs the tip of her tongue under Emma's upper lip, grazing against teeth that have nipped and pinched at the insides of her thighs only moments before. Her fingers go deeper, thumbnail scraping over a hard bundle of nerves that makes Emma buck and whine against her before shuddering and clutching at Regina's body.

A low, satisfied chuckle bubbles up from Regina's throat and she pulls Emma closer, feasting on her mouth. The taste of herself is heady, but as Emma shifts upwards and straddles her legs, Regina feels her heart begin to clatter inside her chest and becomes dizzy under the assault on her senses.

She's surrounded by Emma, blonde hair cascading down as Regina gains more purchase with her fingers, driving them deep and hard inside the other woman. Emma straightens, Regina looks up and for a moment, all she can see is herself in those green eyes, mirrored in a sheen of light that bursts all around her. Pulling on Emma's hair again, Regina exposes the other woman's neck and sinks her teeth into it, biting down hard enough to draw a sharp sound of alarm and pain from a throat that vibrates under her lips.

Emma's hips are rolling now, swirling around on her fingers and there are arms slung around her neck. It feels like they're lovers, like this is more than a last ditch attempt to not be alone, not be the solitary, broken shadow of a former queen that the town wants – _needs_ – her to be. And Regina almost believes it, almost reaches towards this newness as Emma arches her back, thrusting towards what connects them and makes them as whole as they're ever likely to be.

Regina lets go of Emma's hair and recoils involuntarily. This isn't how it's meant to be. Not for them, _especially_ not for her. She's never allowed guilt to wind its tendrils around her and pull her into a pit of her own making, but she closes her eyes for fear of what she might see as Emma crests above her. A loud cry fills her ears and she's covered by Emma's body, shaking and trembling against her own as the blonde falls onto her, face pushed into the crook of Regina's neck.

Breathing hard and mumbling unintelligible words, Emma winds her arms further around Regina's neck, nestling against her in gratitude and supplication.

Staring sightlessly across the room, Regina feels her hands move of their own accord, smoothing up over the rumpled shirt that Emma still wears and across a muscular back that flexes under her touch. It strikes her then, how they seem to fit, how incongruous that is, how wrong and terrible it should feel.

Only, Regina closes her eyes again as Emma's breathing slows and the blonde whispers something against her skin, it doesn't feel wrong at all.


	5. Chapter 5

FIVE

The anxiety wakes Regina early in the morning. It's not the type of hand-wringing, doe-eyed worry that typifies Snow's demeanor. No; this is like a hot stone descending into her chest: heavy, rendering her immobile for a few long minutes. As she lies in her bed, staring up at the ceiling, she can literally feel her heart shrinking away from the shape that disquietude makes inside her, lest it become like so much scorched earth that she's left behind in the world that ruined her.

She's felt pain before; felt her heart constrict with it until she was sure it would disappear altogether. She's felt love swell it, too: bigger than the sky and brighter than the sun. And as much as she loved, she was able to hate, replacing one emotion with another so that her heart could continue to feel something with passion, at least.

But this is different. It's a numbing, unsettling sensation and she tentatively moves her hands and feet just to be certain that she's not paralyzed by it. She takes a breath, holds it, then lets it out slowly. But still that rock of unease burns in her chest, filling her lungs with fire and brimstone.

Turning her head, she looks at the cellphone on her bedside table. The temptation to make a call asking for help, for grace and forgiveness, is overwhelming. Because surely that would ease the distress that tingles down her limbs and pools in the pit of her stomach. Surely that would be enough of a fall for Emma to reach out and elevate her again. She's probably the only person who can.

Moving quickly, Regina snatches the cellphone up in her hand and holds it in trembling fingers. She types in a message – _I need to see you_ – and stares at the blinking cursor on the screen before chewing on her lower lip. Of course, she has no right to demand anything, least of all from Emma. Her days of issuing orders and edicts are gone, as far away as the land she cursed and razed to the ground with anger and vengeance.

It's curious, she thinks, how the anger that sustained her has given way to an all-consuming weariness. Even if she could summon up the energy to feel that rage again, she knows that it would be directed inwards; perhaps that's the source of her anxiety in the first place. Perhaps whatever's left of her heart is finally rotting inside her chest, diseased and broken from all the bad that she wore like a crown of charred revenge.

Closing her eyes for a moment, Regina is beset with the memory of Emma's last visit: a tangle of limbs and a rushed, urgent orgasm that seemed unworthy of the anticipated intimacy they've established. But intimacy, like hope, is fleeting and not to be taken for granted. Of all the people whom the curse has touched with sticky, black fingertips, Regina knows that she and Emma understand that more than anyone else.

She opens her eyes and gazes at the cellphone, at the message she's typed to Emma. Then she presses delete and it disappears from the screen.

XxxXxx

It's almost four o'clock when Emma comes to the door. She slips past it and stands in the hallway, a brown paper bag in her hand, the other shoving at her hair as she appears hesitant, even ill-at-ease.

"You're not dressed," she says, her gaze traveling up and down Regina's silk-clad body. It's a ridiculously obvious statement, but Emma feels awkward enough without even attempting to make polite conversation. Months ago, when she first came here, that might have been what transpired between them, but now…well, _now_ is a whole _lifetime_ away from polite.

"I didn't feel like going in to the office," Regina shrugs carelessly, but her eyes are avaricious and she takes a step closer to Emma. "I'm fairly certain I wasn't missed."

"I don't think – " Emma frowns, but Regina's fingers slide around her neck and pull her in for a hungry kiss. It's as aggressive as it is needy, and Emma staggers backwards under the sheer force of it. Regina's fingers scrabble underneath the collar of her jacket, trying to push it from her shoulders as the kiss increases in intensity and it's all Emma can do to stay on her feet.

When she bumps up against the table in the hallway, the vase on top of it rocking dangerously, she twists out of Regina's grasp and shoves the other woman away. Regina sways in front of her, mouth hanging open, lips reddened and wet. She looks more predatory than Emma's seen her in a long time; more untamed than the distant image of the tightly buttoned Mayor who greeted her with a pained smile when Emma first came here. Like Regina simply doesn't care anymore, about _anything_. Least of all herself.

"What the hell?" Emma exclaims, wiping at her mouth with the back of her hand.

"It's what you want, isn't it?" Regina says, moving forwards again. She presses her lips to Emma's neck, hearing the sharp intake of breath that her touch elicits, but she knows that today, it's what _she_ wants. Emma is stiff, unyielding beneath her hands. Regina's mouth moves over the strong lines of Emma's throat, the tip of her tongue circling the hollow just beneath the blonde's ear. "It's why you come here. The only reason."

She takes Emma's free hand and shoves it inside her robe, pushing it over her breast that's covered only by the nightgown she's been wearing all day. Her nipple springs up, hard in the center of Emma's palm and, for a moment, Regina feels the other woman poise on the cusp of wanting and resisting, the fingers on her breast clenching a little.

Regina isn't sure of how to ask for what she wants. She's not even sure _what_ she wants. But desperation is a powerful motivator and she's now at the point where she'll do anything to try and quell the anxiety that burns in the base of her throat. Even if that means subjugating herself to the Savior. Because those precious moments of oblivion that physical release brings have become the only respite she thinks she's going to get.

"No," Emma says, pushing Regina away with more force than is really necessary. She snatches her hand away from the other woman and clenches it into a fist, glaring at Regina with all the obstinacy she can muster. "Jesus, Regina, what the hell is up with you? You don't show up for work, you spend all day in your robe…are you **sick**?"

Letting out a high-pitched, scornful laugh, Regina grabs the edges of her robe, pulling it around her with the last shreds of dignity she has left. "Sick," she spits. "Well I'd say we **both** are, wouldn't you, Sheriff?"

It hurts – she can see how Emma's cheeks color slightly and how she averts her gaze. Because this is wrong. They both know it. But admission, like the lives they're both trying to live in this town, are locked out of this house and their minds when they're caught up in one another's sighs and moans of heated indulgence.

"I didn't…look," Emma sighs, lifting the brown paper bag in her hand, "I brought you this. Henry's worried about you. He doesn't think you're eating properly and…."

She presses her lips together and looks at Regina now, shaking her head helplessly. "The kid's worried about you."

"He said that?" Regina's voice is hushed. She blinks at Emma, remembering the last time Henry was here, how she'd caught him staring across the room at her when he thought she wasn't looking. He'd been solemn as he left, hugging her with a ferocity that was unusual, bringing a lump to her throat. But the fact that he's confided in Emma stings, and Regina is haughty as she lifts her chin.

"I don't need your charity," she says, pointing at the bag in Emma's hand. But the blonde shrugs and lets out a faint laugh.

"Good," Emma says, pushing Regina in the direction of the kitchen at the back of the house. "Because I brought you a burger and fries instead."

By the time Regina is sitting at her kitchen table and eyeing the dubious grease stain at the corner of the paper bag, Emma is rattling around behind her.

"We're going to have some tea," she throws over her shoulder.

"I don't want tea," Regina says bluntly.

"Yeah? Well I can't stand the stuff," Emma says, making Regina wince as she almost drops what are probably horribly expensive china cups. "But we're gonna have tea anyway and a civilized conversation. And you're gonna eat that burger and fries."

"I'm not a child, Miss Swan," Regina retorts. But as Emma places two steaming cups of tea in front of them and sits down, tearing open the bag to reveal the food, Regina's stomach gurgles with hunger.

Emma unwraps the burger she'd picked up from Granny's and pushes it towards Regina. "Jesus," she sighs. "Just eat the burger, Regina. I have to report back to Henry. I promised."

"I'm not a burger person."

"I'm not a tea person, but here I am anyway. Now eat the damn burger."

They stare at one another before Regina's nostrils flare and she knows that, stubborn as she can be and _has_ been, this is one battle she's not going to win. Not when Henry's concern is at stake. Because she'll do anything to glean even the smallest space in his heart, and the worst part of all this is that Emma knows it too. So as the blonde nods towards the food in front of her, Regina reluctantly picks it up and sinks her teeth into it.

Emma watches Regina chew in silent satisfaction. This is new territory for both of them. Emma's never really stayed in one place long enough to form what could be termed a proper relationship. Her heart was simply too bruised by betrayal to trust in anything other than what her body desired. That part was always easy. It's been easy with Regina over the last few months, too. So when Henry told her his concerns, Emma wondered how she hasn't noticed; how she's become so entrenched in the physical that everything else has gone ignored. She sees it now: the way that Regina has a few more lines around her eyes, how her eyes are duller than before, how her shoulders sag in what looks like defeat.

Emma has a lot of expectations placed upon her and many roles to fulfill: lawkeeper, mother, daughter, Savior. They pull her in so many different directions that she sometimes thinks she'll crack under the strain, that she'll lose whatever essential part of her remains after everyone has taken what they need.

She came here today because of Henry. But she knows that she continues to return because, against all reason, it's _here_ where she feels most like herself. For a woman who demanded everything and forced it out of the townspeople, Regina has never asked for anything more than Emma wants to give. And that might be the biggest change of all; one that happened without either of them acknowledging or even understanding it.

Regina sees Emma gazing at her and puts the burger down, dabbing at the corners of her mouth with a paper napkin that brings a curl of distaste to her lip.

"Good, right?" Emma lifts her eyebrows and grins.

"I've had worse," Regina drawls, but she looks away, down to where her hands are clasped together on the table top. She clenches them together for a moment, wondering at how magnanimity is a quality so unusual in her life that to feel even a sliver of it now prickles tears at the back of her eyes.

"Thank you," she adds quietly. And, just like that, she realizes that her anxiety has dissipated.

Leaning back in her chair, Emma stretches her legs out beneath the table and watches the genuine smile that slides across Regina's lips as the other woman's eyes flicker up to meet her own for a brief moment. It's a rare moment of honesty and, Emma realizes with a distant thrill, it's beautiful. Terrifying. A shift between them and the masquerade they've created.

"You, your Majesty," she murmurs, "are welcome." But there's no malice in her voice anymore, and she thinks she sees another smile on Regina's lips as the woman reaches for a few of the sweet potato fries piled high in brown paper. It's madness, really, this thing that exists between them. But as Regina lets out an appreciative hum and grabs a few more fries, Emma understands that asylum can be found in the most unexpected places.


	6. Chapter 6

SIX

The bed is cold when Regina's fingers stretch across it, the sheets exposed to the morning light where the covers have been carelessly thrown back. As she opens her eyes, she frowns, squeezing her eyes closed and then open again to remove the blur from her vision. She lifts her head, looking down the length of the bed and then across the room. Her clothes are still lying in a heap just inside the door and the sight of them forms her lips into a hard line.

She never used to be so careless. But as she shifts in the bed, a dull ache spreads through her body, swelling a memory of the night before and she knows that it isn't a lack of care that gives her pause.

It had been different with Emma last night: harder, more needy and desperate, much less forgiving. Regina lifts an arm to push at her hair and spies the beginnings of a bruise just above her elbow. She doesn't even want to contemplate what marks might appear on the rest of her body, naked beneath the bedclothes.

Regina always used to take wicked pleasure in emerging from the fray unscathed. But fighting demons is much more difficult and wearing than fighting anyone else, and if these are the battle scars she owes, then she will endure them. Perhaps even wear them with pride one day. And Emma, the instrument of her torture, remains a sword upon which Regina will continue to fall for as long as it takes to feel better, feel something. _Anything_ but the pull of a black abyss which has seduced her for most of her life.

There are moments of something approaching happiness: when Henry smiles at her and takes her hand without being pressed to do so; when she sees in his eyes the sort of forgiveness she never thought she'd find. Even Emma's increasingly frequent visits have provided a salve for the rawness of her heart, found in the shape of the blonde's body and the tangy sweetness of her sweat-soaked skin, the way she holds Regina while their breathing returns to normal, the little kindnesses Emma shows on occasion.

It might not be the happiness of fairytales. But it's more than she's experienced in a long time.

Struggling up onto her elbows, Regina casts a glance around the room. She hadn't intended to fall asleep with Emma still in her bed last night. They'd lain side by side, only their little fingers touching, bodies thrumming with the remnants of spent passion. Regina had been caught in a whirling moment of breathless wonder that still took her by surprise every time she felt it, every time Emma brought her to orgasm and she felt life and light sing in her veins.

She can still feel it now, a low buzzing in her gut and a flood of change at the back of her mind, ready to roll over her and wash her away. The more she tries to lose herself in what she and Emma are doing, the more credible the act seems, the more prescient the feeling that accompanies it. She thinks that she woke during the night to feel Emma's arm slung around her waist and the other woman's body pressed up behind her own, but now, in the morning light that creeps through the gap in the curtains, Regina wonders if it was a dream. A worrying, fanciful want instead of a living, breathing reality.

She's alone again now, dream or not. Emma must have slipped out under the shadow of darkness and there's a part of Regina that can't really blame her. Because no matter how good this feels, it's still wrong and shameful in ways neither of them can really explain or justify.

Regina draws the covers up around her and breathes deeply. Even if it was a dream, she'll take comfort in the idea that someone might stay. That she _wants_ them to, after all these years of pushing so hard that everyone abandons her in the end.

There's a hissed expletive outside her bedroom door before it bursts open and Emma wobbles into the room, barely balancing two cups of coffee in one hand and a plate in the other. She ignores the unrestrained look of surprise on Regina's face and focuses instead on not spilling the coffee until she can finally rest both cups on the bedside table. Emma's made a habit of leaving beds, not sleeping more soundly in them than she can remember in a long time. And _especially_ not in the bed of someone who stirs up such conflicting emotions that's she's sure she's not ready to parse out and unpick.

She sits on the edge of the bed, clutching the plate in both hands and avoids Regina's enquiring gaze.

"I was gonna leave," she says in a rush of breath. "I mean, I was creeping out the door like a teenager or something." She laughs and flushes a little, shaking her head.

"You stayed."

"I fell asleep," Emma shrugs. "You did too."

"This is **my** bed," Regina says, a sardonic smile quirking her mouth. "I belong here, unlike you, dear."

The blonde rolls her eyes and puffs out her cheeks. "Okay," she sighs, "I see you're going to try and make this as awkward as possible. Thanks for that."

Silence falls between them as Regina is suddenly, painfully aware of her own nudity and how inappropriate that seems when Emma's fully dressed. But then, hasn't she always been at a disadvantage with the girl? Hasn't she always been scrabbling to gain the upper hand, left clawing at the canvas of her own demise, painted in broad colors of regret?

"I uh…I toasted you a bagel," Emma suddenly says, holding out the plate in her hand. They both stare down at the charred mess on Regina's fine bone china before Emma frowns and grunts. "Okay, so I incinerated you a bagel," she mumbles and shoves the plate onto the bedside table before grabbing her cup of coffee.

"I have to say," Regina comments, reaching for her own cup and sipping gratefully at the coffee inside it, so strong that she winces as she swallows, "this probably isn't your finest exit strategy."

"What do you mean?" Emma makes herself more comfortable on the side of the bed and eyes Regina carefully.

"You stayed by mistake and yet you're making me coffee and what passes for breakfast," Regina says. "I would have thought you'd be halfway across town by now, running scared."

Emma shrugs and laughs. "I'm not scared of **you**, if that's what you mean." She doesn't intend for it to come out as the challenge that it does, but she sees the gleam in Regina's eyes and meets it head on with a steady gaze. If she's honest with herself, Emma might succumb to the prickle of fear at the back of her neck, walking its way down her spine. Because when she thinks about it – and she can't say that she _hasn't _over the last few months – this place has become her refuge, Regina her solace, of sorts. So when she halted in the hallway this morning, it was because she didn't really want to leave.

And that terrifies her more than any sort of curse Regina might still have the power to cast.

"Here's the thing," Emma begins, wrapping her hands around the warm cup in her grasp. "Everyone here wants something from me, you know? I mean, even my parents want…they want me to be someone that I don't even know I **can** be. And I'm trying to – to be a mom and daughter and **everything** else and it's just…"

She lets out a heavy, grumbling sigh and shakes her head. "It's just crazy. It's all fucking crazy and there's magic and other worlds and portals and…and…"

"You come here to escape that."

Emma presses her lips together and nods. "Basically, yeah."

Regina puts her cup back onto the bedside table and folds her arms over her chest, pinning the bedclothes against the swell of her breasts. "Well," she says in a quiet, resigned tone, "I'm glad I can be of assistance."

Emma's eyebrows rise and she leans back a little, appraising Regina with a gaze that can't quite decide between offended and appalled.

"Is that what you think this is?" she finally says. "Assistance?"

"Emma, dear, it doesn't **matter** what I think. We're both long past thinking that happiness exists for people like us. I'm afraid your parents being who they are might have given you…given **all** of us something like false hope when it comes to happy endings."

It's not the first time Regina's looked vulnerable, but it's the first time she's ever really voiced it, voiced the longing that still exists somewhere deep inside her. It resonates in Emma's chest, striking a chord that plays out in a dissolute, lonely life that has shaped both of them in different ways. Because even a fairytale life isn't made up of what's written; it exists between the lines on pages that don't really begin to tell the full story. And if Emma knows anything, then it's that Regina's tale is much like her own: less told and full of horrors far more real than the villains created to frighten children.

"But false hope…isn't that better than none at all?" she asks, and sees the sad smile that pulls at Regina's lips.

"I used to think so," Regina answers quietly. "But I have Henry back, after a fashion. It's probably more than I deserve. I won't stand in your way when he decides he doesn't want to know me anymore."

"Yeah? Well, guess what, Regina," Emma intones, leaning forwards and putting her cup onto the bedside table next to Regina's. "You **are** in my way. And maybe…maybe that's just how it's supposed to be, you know?"

Regina clearly _does_ know, as her head drops and she clutches at the bedclothes around her. "If I could stop, I would," she whispers. But her heart pounds blood into her ears and she knows that stopping any of this isn't really an option anymore.

"Me too," Emma says. "But I can't, so I made coffee and breakfast instead."

Lifting her head, Regina can't help smiling at the simplicity of the explanation, how it encompasses the ways in which they should rail against this; how it's so telling about the ways in which they won't.

"You should go. Henry will wonder where you are."

Emma nods, slapping her palms onto her thighs before she rises from the bed and looks down at Regina. There's little majesty about the woman; she seems so very small, huddled in her huge bed wrapped only in sheets. It's the most human, the most open and the most beautiful Emma's ever seen her and she swallows as she lingers by the side of the bed.

"I'll come back," she says. It's the only time she's made this promise to Regina since they started this, but she knows as the words leave her lips that she means it.

"I won't be surprised if you don't," Regina draws her knees up and wraps her arms around them, scant protection that they are.

Emma shoves her hands into the pockets of her jeans and turns, walking towards the bedroom door where she pauses and looks back at Regina. "Henry," she says with a frown. "He thinks I'm some sort of White Knight, yes?"

Regina resists the urge to roll her eyes but her nostrils flare and she fixes Emma with a glare that's somewhat akin to her older, harder self. "He does indeed," she says grimly. "And?"

"Then whatever you and I think we know, or don't know about this," Emma says, waving her finger back and forth between them, "we have to have faith in our kid. From the very beginning, he's the one who's always believed in this stuff more than anyone. And he's been right about it, too."

"What are you getting at, Miss Swan?" Regina snaps, discomfort inching its way up her spine.

"Well…" Emma shifts and laughs a little, embarrassed enough by the mere thought to let it turn the tops of her cheeks crimson. But she's done with running, for now. Perhaps forever. And if the town, her parents and Henry want her to take responsibility for who she is, then who she is in this house – to Regina – might be a good place to start shouldering it.

"I don't know much about how it works in your world," Emma continues, reaching for the doorhandle, "but I think I know enough about fairytales to figure out that a knight never leaves her queen."

"That's very noble of you," Regina responds, and she can't stand the way Emma is looking at her, with so much light in her eyes that it's almost blinding. "I'm sure your mother will be overjoyed to hear that."

Emma demurs slightly, her shoulders falling a little and a disconcerted expression flitting over her face for a brief moment. "I don't know about that," she tells Regina, opening the door and hovering on the threshold for a second, "because I wasn't talking about her."


End file.
